The U.N.
has finally joined the chorus of protests long raised by international civil
society against the U.S.-run prison in Guantanamo.

According
to a report by five independent experts commissioned by the U.N., the detention
center for terror suspects in Guantanamo Bay should be shut down immediately
and all detainees should be either tried before an independent tribunal or
released.

The
report documents a long list of gross human rights violations committed in
Guantanamo, from arbitrary detentions to torture.

The
54-page document rightly affirms that force-feeding the detainees on hunger
strike and regular resort to excessive violence are also tantamount to torture.

That
Guantanamo was meant to provide U.S. authorities with a screen to carry out the
dirty business away from public scrutiny has been clear since shortly after
September 11, when the Department of Defense authorized the adoption of
"special interrogation techniques" there.

This
derogation from international human rights conventions and U.S. legislation
bears more than a passing resemblance to the ways of some establishments in
this region.

It is
immensely sad and disarming that the U.S. should end up imitating the worst
aspects of the very systems it says it wants to "democratize."

Even the
attitude of concerned U.S. authorities toward the authors of the U.N. report on
the infamous facility sound terribly familiar to our troubled region.

The
experts were never granted unfettered access to the detention center. Their
individual requests had gone unheeded since 2002, while their requests for
access as a group, as of 2004, were answered with the offer of an organized
tour - an offer that the experts were forced to refuse after it was made clear
to them they would not be allowed to talk directly to detainees.

Even
Jordanian legislation - which undoubtedly still has a long way to go before
effectively guaranteeing and protecting human rights across the board - offers
more guarantees than that.

Before
the publication of this report, there was already little left of the U.S.
reputation as a human rights defender.

Heeding
the report's recommendations on Guantanamo, launching a serious, independent
inquiry into the claims of abuse and torture there, and providing adequate and
just compensation to the victims would be the first steps toward restoring the
credibility of Washington's human rights record.